"Tom, do you know that I very often find myself looking about me, and asking myself if all that has happened is true or a dream," said Bramble to me, as we sat inside of the coach to Dover, for there were no other inside passengers but ourselves. "I can't help thinking that great good fortune is as astounding as great calamity. Who would have thought, when I would, in spite of all Bessy's remonstrances, go round in that ship with you, that in the first place we should have been taken possession of by a privateer in the very narrows (he was a bold cruiser, that Frenchman)? After we were captured I said to myself, Bessy must have had a forewarning of what was to happen, or she never would have been, as I thought, so perverse. And since it has turned out so fortunately, I can't help saying how fortunate it was that we did not allow her to persuade us; for had we not both gone, nothing could have been done. Well, I think we may promise Bessy this time when we meet her, that we will not trust ourselves to salt water again in a hurry. What do you think, Tom?" "No; I think the best thing I can do is to marry, and live on shore," replied I. "Yes, Tom, that's it. Give me your hand, you don't know how happy you make me; we'll all live together. But where shall we live? for the poor little cottage that I thought quite big enough for us a month ago will not do now." "We have plenty of time to talk that over, father. I love the cottage for many reasons; although, as you say, it is not large enough now for our means, or future way of living." "And I love it too, boy; I love to look out of the door and see the spot where my Bessy rescued me from death. God bless her! she is a noble girl, Tom, though I say it who--but I'm not her father, after all, and if I were, I would still say it." "It is evident, by her letter to you, that she has been most anxious about us. What will she say when she hears we have both been wounded?" "Ay! it wouldn't have done to have told her that, or she would have set off for Chatham, as sure as we are sitting here." Here a pause ensued for some time, and we were busied with our own thoughts: the silence was at last broken by me. "Father," said I, "I should like to ask my father and Peter Anderson to come down to us; they can easily get leave." "Is it to be present at your wedding, Tom?" "Exactly--if Bessy will consent." "Well, I have no doubt of that, Tom; but she will now require a little courting, you know why." "Why, became all women like it, I suppose." "No, Tom; it is because she was in love before you were, d'ye understand?--and now that things are all smooth, and you follow her, why, it's natural, I suppose, that she should shy off a little in her turn. You must mind that, Tom; it's a sort of soothing to the mortification of having at one time found herself, as it were, rejected."